Review.
A Curates Egg
This is supposed to be a history of UK Folk Clubs, It seems to have a majority content of london and to a lesser extent Birmingham, it also is heavily focussed on the sixties and to a lesser extent the seventies and and then skips to the 21st century, and skips a generation, to their children such as nancy kerr, lisa carthy ben paley.
ignoring many of the song carriers of the 80s and 90s, such as Jez Lowe, Steve Turner Nick Dow Chris Foster Pete Coe Brian Peters Wilson Family, Bill Caddick Peter Bond Paul Metsers Alistair Anderson keith hancock Richard Grainger Damien Barber all of whom were backbones of the 80s and 90s folk club scene. we have twenty pages about Ewan MacColl, nothing about songwriters Leon Rosselson, nothing about Graeme Miles, Ed Pickford, Jez Lowe, Ron Angel AnnLister KEITHmARSDEN and more who were prolific wrioters in the 80s and 90s.
some predictable negafivity from bob davenport about MacColls name, but he does not criticise Johnny Handles name change, plus another stupid remark from Bob Davenport about his visit to the newprt folk festival in the USA[ WHAT IS THE RELEVANCE OF THIS TO UK FOLK CLUBS] Quote "they were having these workshops for instruments a real protestant thing they couldnt just enjoy the music" what a bigoted and negative and ignorant comment
the 21st century has shown that workshops on the internet and other wise are good ways to improve, and my god there are a few singers in singers clubs that could with a few workshops on presentation and learning words
No, this book,imo gives a london and birmingham centric view of the sixties and early seventies folk clubs gioves the impression there were no new song carriers in the 80s and 90s and nothing happened then till about 2005, where were the missing 25 years, and all those song carriers and song writers.
I will be positive and say it is not a continuous history of uk folk clubs, and at best is a curates egg and at worst is a divisive and only partly accurate view of uk folk clubs.
A good subject matter but not dealt with in much depth. I Was There   
Dick Miles